


Smiling Through Tears

by orphan_account



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Crying, Gen, Recreational Drug Use, Sad, tragic backstory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-09
Updated: 2014-09-09
Packaged: 2018-02-16 17:31:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2278524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's rainy and Alex is bored and Sean is smoking weed.<br/>But why is Sean crying?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smiling Through Tears

**Author's Note:**

> For a friend who nearly lost her mum to cancer

It was a cold and rainy afternoon and, much as Alex would prefer to be training, there was no choice but to stay indoors. He knew that Hank would scarcely have noticed, cooped up in his lab, and that Raven would be listening to music or reading in her room. The professor was probably in his study, and Erik could either be doing whatever mysterious and potentially scary thing it was that he did in his own room, or he might be with Charles.  
Alex, with nothing better to do, just wandered around the (extensive) halls and corridors, hands in his pockets, staring through the walls and the windows and the paintings into the vagueness of his own thoughts.  
His thoughts, at that moment, were 'Where's Sean'?  
On rainy days - or any other days, actually - Sean could often be found smoking suspicious cigarettes that Erik snorted at, Charles disapproved of and Raven coveted. Hank, they suspected, didn't realise there was weed in them.  
Alex knew, or at least he hoped, that Sean wasn't high ALL the time (he just acted like it), but there was a fair wedge of the time when he was, and it was usually when there was nothing important happening.  
So he's probably stoned, thought Alex. But where is he? His room was empty - Alex had wandered casually past and found nothing - but that didn't mean anything. There had to be hundreds of rooms in the mansion. If Sean wanted to go somewhere private to smoke weed, he'd just have to use a spare one.

For quite a while, Alex walked without any sign of other (mutated) human beings anywhere, and then somewhere in an isolated little back end, he heard broken, ragged breathing.  
It was shaky, as though someone was crying, and when Alex heard it he paused, unsure. Everyone in the mansion was a little messed up. Charles and Raven with growing up in this place, neglected and alone, and other things, Alex thought, that they hadn't told the others but nonetheless hung unsaid in the air; Erik with the Nazis and his mom and Shaw and being tortured and basically EVERYTHING; Hank being bullied for a long time, knowing that if he hit back the other guy would be in hospital and so never, never fighting them, and being so nerdy and awkward all the time; Alex having been in prison, hurting the people he loved accidentally and losing his brother...  
But it's just Sean, Alex reasoned. There's nothing too tragic about Sean's existence. Right?  
I don't know, he realised. For all that we talk and we live together, I don't really know much about Sean's life.

He took a few steps further forward and, because of the way the door was ajar, could see the aforementioned ginger mutant lying sprawled out on a bed, looking blankly at the ceiling, silent tears streaming from his eyes. Hanging limply from his fingers was one of his cigarettes, but it had gone out. He didn't seem to notice.  
For a moment Alex stood there, frozen. If he went in, what would he say? He was a guy. A guy who'd been in prison for assault and arson and manslaughter, take your pick. 'Feelings' weren't really his strong point.  
But if he didn't go in, how the hell would he ever broach the subject again? 'Oh, hey Sean, remember that time you were crying helplessly in an abandoned wing in the mansion? Yeah. I saw. Why was that?"  
And it wasn't like he could just ignore it. Sean, his friend, a guy who'd saved his life both personally and indirectly by helping to defeat Shaw, was crying, and Alex couldn't just leave him.

He opened the door slowly, watching as Sean's eyes forced themselves over to him and his breathing hitched even worse, transforming into fully-fledged sobs that racked his chest and shoulders in a way that seemed almost physically painful.  
Taking a deep breath, he turned over to his side, away from Alex, and screwed his eyes shut.  
Swallowing any doubts he had, and his instinctual desire to run away and get Raven to deal with it, Alex padded gently forward to Sean. For a fraction of a moment, he hesitated awkwardly, and then placed what was hopefully a comforting hand on his shoulder.  
Keeping his hand where it was, Alex sat down on the bed.  
"What-"  
"Maaaaan," said Sean, and Alex suddenly realised that he was not only stoned, but COMPLETELY stoned. "Don't." His words weren't slurred, but they were dragged out and cracked from the crying.  
"Don't ask me why, because then I'll have to tell you why, and I don't want to tell you, man."  
For a minute, Alex hoped that maybe, just maybe, he was on some more serious drugs and was crying over a hallucination, or perhaps that he was remembering some hamster he had as a kid that had died or something.  
"You don't have to tell me," he said quietly. "I don't mind."  
"Yeah, you do. You totally do. Why else would you come in and actually-"  
"Because you're my friend!"  
Sean could feel the righteous indignation emanating out from Alex without having to look at him, and didn't turn his head, still staring straight at the covers. Alex was nearly always some form of angry, even if that was usually fine.  
"It's stupid," he promised quietly, raising a hand to wipe away some of the tears. " 'Cos everyone's got their thing, right? All their locked up trauma and shit. I mean, even Angel and Darwin had to deal with stuff, and eventually she couldn't and she went over to the other guys. Like, racism and her being a stripper and all."  
"Dude," said Alex incredulously. "I'm not going to judge you on how normal your life was. The only reason mine wasn't was-"  
Everything. The plane crash, not being allowed to see Scott, his stupid foster parents, that guy who wouldn't leave him alone, the fire that started and he had no idea how, then realising he was a mutant and all the damage he caused when he was angry and then being in jail and then solitary confinement and...  
"It's just coincidence, alright? You're like, the only normal person here."  
Sean laughed. It was the closest to 'bitter' his easy-going, friendly personality could ever get.  
"No one in this place is normal. We're all mad here, right?"  
Alex smiled. "Yeah, right. Look, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to. I'm serious."  
"Nah, dude. Gotta tell you now, right? We're mates. I don't want to, but I guess I'm going to."  
He took a quick deep breath, like he did before he screamed, and Alex instinctively braced himself. Sean didn't scream though. He just began to speak, quiet and removed and with small sobs still shaking his torso and tears still running down his cheeks.  
"My parents split when I was like eight, and, you know, that's not that tragic. I've got two little sisters and a little brother and they're annoying and all but we all kinda get along. My dad's a nice guy and everything, but I lived with my mom."  
For a moment he didn't say anything. Then he continued.  
"Then two years ago she got sick. Really bad. It was cancer, apparently, but she didn't tell anyone until it was too late. So I don't have a mom anymore, and that's sad - like, really, really sad - but that's not like you or Erik or-"  
"That's still sad." Alex's interruption was small and gentle, but it was there. Sean shuffled back a bit and turned over, then wrapped his arms around the older boy.  
"I know. It's just... She's never coming back, man. It's really sad."  
Alex didn't move, hugging Sean back.  
"Come on. She was a nice person, right?"  
"Yeah."  
"Then remember that. That's how I manage."  
Sean rolled back into his back, eyes darting as he stared at things Alex couldn't see.  
"You're so high right now, aren't you?" said Alex after a minute, and Sean started laughing through the tears.  
"Yeah. Yeah, I am pretty high."  
They stayed like that, laughing and crying, for a long time.


End file.
